


An Ode to Music

by endrega_Turtlesse



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Bittersweet, Both Platonic and Romantic, Family Feels, Feels, Happy Ending, Love, Minor Character Death, Music, Other, POV Sam Wilson, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Sam Wilson Feels, Sam Wilson-centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-21
Updated: 2020-04-21
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:29:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23762341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/endrega_Turtlesse/pseuds/endrega_Turtlesse
Summary: Playing the guitar is music, and music is love.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Sam Wilson, Sam Wilson & his family, Steve Rogers & Sam Wilson
Comments: 8
Kudos: 22





	An Ode to Music

Sam never told anyone he plays the guitar. It’s not that he’s ashamed of it – not at all, really. It’s just, it feels too private. Even though he knows he could be the cool kid, even though he knows girls and boys all like it, men and women, too, it feels to private.

To him, the guitar is being five and sitting at his grandfather’s knee as he strums, his granma singing along from the kitchen. Then it’s being six, finally being allowed in the kitchen, listening to his grandfather play in the living room, armchair by the fireplace even if Sam can’t see it, and singing along with his granma, because cooking and singing go together. His granma cooks and his grandfather gives her music.

Playing the guitar is his father grumbling about his grandfather being off-key but protesting if the music stops. It’s his mother looking at them fondly, never quite understanding music, always slightly out of place, but always loved, still. It’s Christmases and Sundays and evenings, for as long as Sam can remember, and the world is right. Playing the guitar is love, and safety, and home.

Music is silence, the slow movement of the coffin, his grandfather being lowered into ground. It’s crying from the kitchen, because there’s no music but dinner still has to be made. Music is his mother turning on the radio and then turning it off again because it’s wrong. Music is wrong if it doesn’t come from the guitar, and Sam is only seven but he understands that. He understands more than people think he does, except maybe his granma, because when he asks, she gets him a small guitar for Christmas. His father protests, because there’s not enough money, but his granma buys it anyway.

His grandfather’s guitar is put in the attic, but that’s alright because he has one of his own now.

Music is him fumbling along the chords. Music is still grating, it’s still imperfect, but his mother doesn’t say anything, and if he gets a small tune right, his granma will sing.

Music is getting more confident, and it’s learning to play and sing at the same time, because it’s not right that his granma has to sing alone now. It’s his father finally grumbling but protesting still if the music stops. And playing the guitar is no longer sitting in the armchair by the fireplace, but it’s still music, and that’s what counts. Music is playing the guitar, and singing, and still home and love and safety.

Sam breaks his guitar when he’s thirteen. He shatters it right over his knee, and weeps. He throws it over the second coffin lowered into the ground, because music was his granma, and music is dead now.

He thinks briefly about getting a new guitar when he’s sixteen. He’s young, and he thinks he’s in love. He sings to her, because love is music, but he doesn’t get a new guitar. Two months later he’s glad he didn’t, because he doesn’t want to break another guitar.

He does get a new guitar when he meets Riley. He knows he’s not supposed to love him like that, but music is love but most people don’t understand that, and that makes it safe. He gets his guitar for Riley. He doesn’t get to use it, though, because it arrives just before they have to leave on mission. Afterwards, he breaks his second guitar.

He gets his third guitar after the helicarriers crash. He doesn’t know who he’s getting it for, but he doesn’t worry. His granma used to tell him that music and love will always find you, and even though he can’t believe it yet, he gets his third guitar.

He takes two things with him when he goes with Steve, his wings and his guitar. When Steve asks what’s in them, he pretends not to understand the question, because answering doesn’t feel right, and Steve drops it. Sam doesn’t have much time for it anyway, and he thinks that means his granma was wrong. She was wrong, because if he doesn’t have time for music, he doesn’t have time for love.

Music is now listening to the radio as they drive. Music is listening to Steve curse because that means he hasn’t yet managed to kill himself. Music is silence when they get home after another failure, and Sam thinks it’s not unlike the silence after his grandfather died. Barnes isn’t really dead, but he might as well be right now, and maybe it’s worse if your loved one isn’t really dead.

His third guitar gets smashed when Barnes finds them instead. It’s a night filled with a lot of shooting, and a lot of bleeding, and a lot of dying, but not them. Whatever the odds were, the three of them only shoot and bleed but not die, and Sam thinks that’s maybe his granma, because if he dies now, music dies, too. He doesn’t even think to check on his guitar until early morning, and when he sees the smashed pieces, he honestly gives up. He looks up and asks his granma to forgive him, because she might have saved him but he can’t save music.

Barnes moves in with them, and music becomes muffled screams in the dead of night, and Sam thinks music should have died if this is what it became. So instead he makes hot chocolate, because cooking isn’t music, but this isn’t love anyway. Music becomes sitting in the kitchen, silent, drinking hot chocolate, while Steve sleeps on. It becomes halting conversation and broken confessions, and Sam thinks this is better than screaming.

It takes a lot of nights, and a lot of hot chocolate, but the conversation becomes easier, smoother, and Sam idly thinks about a guitar.

Hot chocolate turns to breakfasts, and confessions turn to soft. One day Sam leaves, and goes back home, and he digs through the attic. When he gets back, James’ eyebrows are pinched, but when Sam doesn’t leave again, he starts smiling.

Sam is thirty-six, and he’s playing the guitar again. It’s a little off-key, a little rusty, but that’s alright because the guitar needs to be strung up again, too. Love is music, and music is rusty, but practice made it good once, and it can make it good again. And if it never gets to be quite perfect, if it will always be a little off-key, then Steve can grumble and protest still if the music stops, while Bucky sings along.

**Author's Note:**

> I had feels. If I made you have feels, too, come talk to me if you wanna.
> 
> I play lots of instruments but not the guitar so if I got something wrong, please tell me. The guitar and Sam just fit.


End file.
